Doug Ownbey, of Brainerd, assembles backpacks filled with provisions for homeless people.Bill Ownbey, 61, works at a candy factory. He does shift work at Wrigley Manufacturing Co. on Jersey Pike, operating a machine that makes gummies.
Quietly, Ownbey, who lives in Brainerd, has become one of Chattanooga's most interesting, small-scale philanthropists.
About eight years ago, the hourly worker decided to buy some cheap backpacks and fill them with provisions to help homeless people in downtown Chattanooga make it through the winter.
To decide what to buy, he said, he imagined himself stuck on the streets.
"I thought, 'If I were hungry or cold or needed to get out of the rain, what would I need,'" he explained.
Ownbey settled on a packing list that includes wash cloths, knitted caps, gloves, socks, shaving cream, razors, soap, bandages, toothbrushes, hand sanitizers, combs, brushes and plastic silverware - anything that would make life on the streets a little easier.
There's also lots of food stuffed in those packs including candy, cookies, crackers, Spam, peanut butter, Vienna sausages and tuna.
For almost a decade, Ownbey has been assembling these bags of provisions at his home in Brainerd and handing them out at the Chattanooga Community Kitchen on East 11th Street the first week in December.
Doug Ownbey, of Brainerd, assembles backpacks filled with provisions for homeless people.He has learned how to stretch a dollar. For example, he found a supplier online that ships two dozen surplus backpacks for $72. Most of the contents of the backpacks are donated. He figures he spends only about $200 or $300 out of pocket each year.
He deflects praise for his efforts, preferring to give the credit to a circle of a few dozen friends in five states who help him with donations.
"When I sit down and explain it to people they might hand me $10 or $20," he says. "I'm just their hands and feet."
Some of his benefactors are more like partners in the little charity, Ownbey said. One Facebook friend in California shipped a half-dozen fully loaded backpacks this year, he said. Another friend gives socks ever year. Someone sent him a sack of umbrellas.
Mark KennedyView other columns by Mark Kennedy
Ownbey began this as a simple act of kindness, but one backpack recipient several years ago turned it into a near obsession. The second year of his little charity, Ownbey arrived on 11th Street with three backpacks, he recalled. One went to a homeless man named Doug, who thanked Ownbey and gave him a hug.
"The next year, out of the clear blue, Doug showed up again," Ownbey said. "This time he came up and said to me, 'I used everything in that backpack to better myself, and to get a job, and now I'm not homeless any more."
Ownbey says learning that a simple act of kindness could be a life-altering gift keeps him coming back to the Community Kitchen year after year.
And things continue to grow. This year he said he has 30 backpacks to hand out. He said he will be taking two pickup trucks and several friends to help him complete the job.
Oddly, he believes his friends get more from the experience than the homeless folks.
"It seems like it's a life-changing experience for the givers," he said. "It does something to them to see how happy these people are."
Ownbey said he is just living out the Bible verse that says it's better to give than receive.
"It's a good feeling," he said. "It makes you feel like you haven't wasted your life - that you are actually trying to help somebody."
Contact Mark Kennedy at mkennedy@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6645.